A younger Alex found himself standing in front of a door, the same door that was locked tightly by what seemed like over a hundred locks. "How many times have I had this dream again?", he thought to himself as he looked around.
For some reason, Alex felt as if there was some sort of reason that a door was there. But he never really had any dream like this until very recently, that and his nightmares, he couldn't figure out if this was really that important enough.
"Alex.", Alex tilted his eyebrow as he heard an... unfamiliar yet familiar voice on the other side of the door. He swore he heard this voice from somewhere but he just... couldn't make it out.
"Hey uh ... who are you? What's this door for anyways?", the childish voice of Alex says as he lifted his hand up to open the door.
"Do not open that door, no matter what, no matter who tells you. Never open this door."
And just like that, Alex found himself on his bed again in his usual body, only this time he didn't wake up with any nose bleeding or a numb left arm like the last few times he had this dream... thankfully. "I wonder if Hope can make a dream catcher, I need one of those right now."
Alex looked over to his dear, four legged best friend, who just sat there and tilted his head at the human owner. "Yeah it's another one of those dreams, don't worry about it Pickle.", in response his dog just barked at him. "Whatever man."
He looked over at his plumber made phone and turned it on, Alex checked the date and let out an exhausted sigh. "Gotta love these lazy Saturday mornings. Eh I better get up.", he says as he picked himself off his bed and tossed on a grey shirt. "I think the Phantom Stranger marathon is today."
Alex let out a yawn as he exited his room, Pickle followed him cluelessly as he descended the flight of stairs. Considering his mothers schedule, he needed to go down quietly rather than jumping down like he would usually. "I should definitely explore the ocean with Lagoon one of these days, now that I have three hours to spend."
"Hmmm...", he tapped his chin before he activated the Omnitrix, he scrolled through the arsenal of silhouettes of all of his current aliens. "There ya are.", with a quick press he transformed into BassBoost and generated two others.
"Nothin better than just hanging out with yourself when you don't have that many friends.", the second BassBoost remarked as he quickly walked to the couch and pulled himself onto it.
"You're not wrong but you don't have to be an asshole about it.", said the third BassBoost as he walked to the kitchen, creating more clones ontop of himself to grab bread while another open the fridge.
"My point exactly.", the original Bassboost says as he joined the second in the couch, the third coming back with a sandwich in hand and joined the others. "Hmm..."
The sandwich holding BassBoost created another, causing it to slip down and sit on the floor. "So, what's goin on today fellas?"
"Why the fucking are you asking us and how are you eating a sandwich with no teeth?", a BassBoost pointed at the sandwich eating clone as it just shrugged with a smug smirk. "Figures. Let's see what that blow hard Harangue is up to, it's been a minute since I last had a good laugh."
"I'm down.", the Bassboost that sat on the floor got up and picked up the remote, throwing it to the couch dwellers. One of them caught it and turned the TV on, it took a few seconds but they found the news channel.
["GOOOOOOOOD MORNING HARANGUE NATION! It's your host, Will Harangue. To those watching we have some surprising news revolving those alien 'heroes' we've been seeing since the summer of 2005"]
"Hey, he might say something good about us finally.", one of the BassBoosts says throwing his arms up before the sandwich eating one hit him on the side of the head with his half eaten sandwich.
["For the past year, we might've been dealing with a mass alien invasion by these strange creatures.", images of VastMass lifting up a skyscraper was shown complimented with others such as Lagoon ripping through a boat with some sort of walrus suited man, Drag Racer saving a little girl from a collapsing building, Circuit Breaker possessing a van and driving it around, Trench Monkey eating a large burger while fighting a horde of DNAliens, Extinction fighting a Highbreed, Refracture just flying around with a drink in hand, Crazy Diamond sitting on a bench while eating a burrito and Melthing wandering a sewer.]
"Man they missed the one with Battery Acid giving Cash a wedgie.", the sandwich eater says sadden as the one on his left patted his back.
"Don't worry, I'm sure it's something good."
{"Turns out, all of these alien monsters might be connected after all. See we're not dealing with an invasion of other aliens as an anonymous source has given thorough evidence of these creatures actually being one singular man after all.", Harangue says as the high school picture day photo showing an awkward Alex popped up. "His name being, Alexander Theodore Tennant."]
"AIN'T NO WAY!", all four BassBoosts stood up in response to that.
"THATS CRAZY!"
"IMPOSSIBLE."
"I CAN'T BELIEVE HE USED THAT PHOTO! ITS SO AWFUL!"
"Hey, that shirt was classy at least. Perfect photo honestly."
"Nah nah, like we got so many backup plans for this."
"IT DONT MATTER NO MORE BRO!", a green flash erupted, only one Alex sitting there on the couch in genuine surprise and shock.
"Okay... okay, let's just calm down.", Alex slid down and took a deep breath with wide eyes before turning off the TV with a paler face than usual. "Just gotta deal with this with titanium nuts, like always."
"Shut the fuck up, Jesus.", Bradley calls out from stop the stairs wearing nothing but pajamas. "The fuck are you even doing?"
"Oh hey bronchitis, my identity just got out so now I need to deal with this shit.", Alex says casually.
"Okay, first of all, I had bronchitis a month ago. Second... what do you mean by that?", Bradley was now wide awake the moment he heard bronchitis... that and something about an identity.
"Oh yeah, someone leaked my identity."
"I heard that part jackass, but why are you so nonchalant about it?"
"I mean if I panic then I'll do some stupid shit."
"Dude.", Bradley pinched the bridge of his nose. "Your logic is absolutely baffling, I would be fucking shitting bricks if someone found out about the whole Venom incident."
"Well they haven't, have they?", Alex just laughed. "Yeah I've got a few plans to deal with something like this.", he says as he was already on his phone, he let out another laugh at message board that discussed the origins of his aliens freaking out.
"Do you not have a sense of urgency or something?"
"You're the dude who wrote a song about a girl acting like there aren't a million of those out there, so by default you're not allowed to have an opinion.", Alex says with a smug grin.
Bradley deadpanned and flipped him off. "Fuck you, I'm going back to sleep. Deal with this yourself.", he says as he walked behind a corner and back into his room, the creak of a door closing made that very clear.
"Okay. Let's see what my biggest fan thinks of me.", Alex quips quietly to himself as he picks up the remote and turns the TV back on, as he had left the channel like that all he saw next was an old video of Muscle Bound with his foot stuck in a hole. "Ugh, not that again."
{"Nothing has been proven yet, however it can be extremely likely. With a copious amount of videos displaying these seemingly unconnected attacks, it's almost like he wanted us to figure it out.", Harangue played a video of Dying Silence scaring children, Blight eating a bunch of chocolate and Lagoon shoving his head into a water fountain. "Alex Tennant, threat or menace. Call in with your vote. Now in other news-"}
"Wow, what a list of choices.", Alex scoffed at this, even before this all happened Harangue already hated his aliens. There were extremely rare instances of him actually praising the actions his aliens took, but it was mostly videos edited to make him look like the bad guy. "I wonder what would've happened if Ben got it. All I know is that he would've taken it off by now, going by what he told me."
"Ugh. Finding the fucker is gonna be a major headache-"
"Wassup?", Alex jolted forward as he saw Charmcaster was standing behind him in a purple shirt and black shorts holding a bag of food. "I stole someone's order when I was passing by. So, what'll be a headache?"
"Oh someone revealed my identity."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"Hm, that's not good.", Charmcaster had responded with the little amount of urgency that Alex himself showed. "So, got any idea to deal with it?"
"Eh, I'd say so but I'm not really confident.", Alex comments nonchalantly as he was expecting a knock or some clamoring at his front door any moment now.
"So... are you gonna explain your idea or not?"
"Oh I'm just gonna wear black wristbands.", Alex remarks with a nonchalant hand wave.
"It worked just as intended doctor.", said a familiar deep voice with a hint of passive aggression, a laugh was heard across him.
"Did you truly believe that the great Doctor Animo wouldn't deliver? I'm insulted!", Animo exclaimed with a wide grin complimented with a look of satisfaction. "Though this is only stage one!"
Animo pointed to a strange creature that strongly resembles a humanoid cockroach but with some... unique features. This creature had a skeletal layer on its body that covers its head but does not fully cover its exposed torso, like a regular cockroach it has antennae on its head and across its back. "Who... Who am I?", it spoke in a soft voice but it was so deep it actually caused the room to vibrate only slightly.
"Where are my manners!", Doctor Animo wasn't entirely used to having a creature that can actually converse with him, mainly due to his henchmen being frogs or giant birds. "You are the Roach King."
"Roach King? What a childish name."
"Do you have anything better? No? THEN SHUT UP!", Animo snapped at this proclamation that the moniker given to his newest creation was lackluster. "Now then, it is time for us to prepare for stage two!"
"And what is that? You're also acting like stage one isn't enough.", the man says gesturing to the meshwork that was a mutant cockroach. "It has enough intelligence to communicate clearly and can understand us perfectly fine."
"Well, if you want to get that Tennant brat a run for his money then bigger is better!", Animo says as he gestured to a set of multi colored liquids in different vials.
"Tennant?", the Roach King says with an almost childlike level of curiosity.
Animo grinned as he pointed at the newly born creature. "See, my beautiful creation, Alexander Tennant is a very bad person."
"Very bad?"
"VERY very bad.", Animo began talking to it like the newborn that it is. "See, what we need you to do is at least push him. That is all."
"Where can I find him?"
"Patience, uh, little one, you're not prepared for that yet... but soon.", the mad doctor says with a strangely wide grin
"How soon?"
"VERY! So don't you FUCKING rush me!"
Alex tapped at the arm rest of his couch as his foot tapped rapidly against the floor, Charmcaster just looked at him and rubbed his shoulder. Despite his facade of nonchalance, she could see right through it and knew he was genuinely worried. "So, what's on your mind?"
It took a second for Alex to think of a response, almost as if he was carefully choosing his answer. "I'm fine, this should be more of a benefit than anything-", and that's when he heard something shattering against the downstairs window, not the glass but almost as if something equally as fragile was thrown into it with so much force it exploded.
With a groan, Alex stood up from his seat and went to the door. Peeking through the peep hole, he saw two kids that he assumed to be younger than him throwing what looked like eggs at his house. "On second thought, maybe not.", he opened the door and stepped out, leaning against the open door at the two kids.
The two noticed him, looked at each other, looked back at him and then ran off screaming in a mocking way. Charmcaster texted her head on his shoulder as she watched the two run off. "Better than reporters right?"
"No comment."
The rest of that day and the following day were something Alex himself wouldn't particularly love, firstly he had to deal with police coming into his house and bringing him into the station only to release him an hour later thanks to some mysterious force covering his more... questionable tracks.
Secondly, Alex had to deal with the plague rats of society known as paparazzi. The main issue with this is the fact he can't harm them as he would further the problems unnecessarily. Apparently, Ben and Gwen were questioned in Bellwood but let off due to not having much of a presence, or at least that's what Max had informed him.
Saturday had passed and Sunday was essentially identically besides some people stopping him on his walk to get the things he needed to get and screaming at how he's a monster and a demon that needs to be touched by god.
Alex was used to the slander, but this just... hurt. He wouldn't lie, it genuinely discouraged him and made him feel like all the things he was doing were just making the other problems worst. As Monday had finally rolled in, Alex took a few minutes more to get words of encouragement from his mother.
And there Alex was, walking the halls of his high school as he usually would, the only thing different was the glances and people moving away from him as if they were terrified of his existence. The worst part was a dark haired girl staring at him intently.
"C'mon c'mon.", Alex glanced at the clock as it ticked past slowly, were classes always this long and he hadn't noticed? He felt eyes staring at him despite nobody actually looking at him and just going about their business. "Fuck, should I use him? No, Paradox told me that ends out badly if I did try. SHIT!"
"I'm gonna find that piece of shit and rip him a new asshole.", was what Alex told himself, plotting the vicious ways he could get his payback.
"Mr. Tennant.", Alex looked up at his teacher that seemingly teleported to him, he had a worried expression on his face. No, not worry, it was almost as if the color was sucked out of the bigger bodied yet healthy high school teacher.
"Uh, yes Mr. Black?", Alex sat up and nervously adjusted himself. That's when he notices the other teens had began shivering in fear.
"I believe you're dismissed.", the teacher pointed out to see a giant creature resembling a patchwork of bones and insect approaching the school with thundering steps.
Alex looked over and smiled at the strangely familiar creature. "Oh well, this was gonna happen anyways.", he says as he activated the Omnitrix and earned the attention of the students and even the teacher. "Might as well accept it."
The creature roared as it started charging forward at nightmarish speeds, Alex grinned as he opened the classroom window and threw himself out. A green flash erupted as Mach Manta flew forward at high speeds, the Roach King screeched before throwing a two armed haymaker.
The people of Pittsburg were going about their day as they usually would've, young adults on their commutes to their colleges or work and possibly back home after a night shift, the older generations minding their own business and going about their life.
That was when, the titan sized Roach King was sent crashing into a building at tremendous speeds. "My bad!", Shock Jock exclaimed as his fist was covered in violet blood, cyan electricity surging around his body before he was grabbed by one of the massive arms and thrown into a building with the same amount of force.
Before Shock Jock could move out the way, the giant roach was on him again. "DIE!", the Roach King roared as he unleashed a barrage of high speed punches with all four of his arms, the force of these punches were more than enough to completely obliterate the building that held him there.
"Damn, for a B List villain, Animo really knows how to put me to work!", Shock Jock blocked all the punches that sounded more like a machine gun than anything human with the way those punches tore through the air. With one final punch, Shock Jock was sent hurdling out and into another building. As he was mid air he slapped his Omnitrix and transformed into Bass Boost.
"WALL. OF-", BassBoost caught himself in the air as a more than a dozen of himself emerged. "SOUND!", the Sonic screams that followed this caused the Roach King to grab at what would be his ears in pain.
BassBoost dropped down and transformed into Blazemash, his arm splitting open before he unleashed a powerful blast of fire and completely obliterated any rubble along with covering the creature with intense flames
With this done, another green flash erupted and Refracture rocketed into the air. Unleashing a barraged of charged crystals at the creatures upper left arm, the crystals completely obliterated the lower part of the arm and leaving an ugly stump. "WHY SIDE WITH ENEMY?! THEY'VE BROUGHT NOTHING BUT TROUBLE TO OUR HOME!", it screamed out in genuine anger.
"Enemy?", Refracture echoed as the booming voice shook felt like it shook the city itself. "What enemy? You mean Zeke?", he crossed his arms in confusion.
"So you want to play dumb huh? You want to be play the superhero role? Okay then!", the Roach King grabbed a young man as he was running away and caught a speeding car with his remaining arms. "How about this? A young man with a bright future, or a car filled with a man and his loving family!"
Refracture's energy burned around him as his crystals flickered from their bright rainbow colors. "You don't need to bring in people who have nothing to do with this!"
"Oh no, you see this is completely necessary! From what I've heard you'd do anything to win, no matter what! But what happens when I bring in outside help? Which will you save first! ALEX THE HERO!!!", the Roach King lifted his arms high in the air and dropped what he held.
The young man and the family screamed in fear as they plummeted to the ground. That's when Refracture's brain kicked into gear, propelling himself forward he transformed into Blight. He let out a roar as multiple tendrils sprouted and lunged forward, catching the car and the young man to lower them into safety. Blight laughed as he leapt into the air with his remaining momentum.
"WHAT?!", The Roach King tried defending himself only for all of his arms to be sliced off with several black blades. "Wait!-", it was cut off before Blight used his powerful symbiotic tendrils to catapult himself forward and slice through his skull like head and tore through his brain, violet colored blood and brain matter erupted from what was left of the head as it dropped to the ground with a massive thud.
The headless roach mutants body slumped to the ground as the young man caught his breath, the family thanking god or some other cosmic force that they were saved. Blight had landed on the roof of the building, plucking up a small calico cat and detransforming within a bright green flash.
"You okay little guy?", Alex says with blood leaking from his forehead from an earlier wound along with his clothing torn up. The cat simply let out a meow in response. "That's good to hear, now let's get ya down."
After stopping by a store and borrowing new clothes, Alex used Drag Racer to quickly make it back to his school. It might've been the adrenaline still rushing through him, but he felt a bit... lighter than before.
The day went on with its usual antics, Alex falling asleep in his math class only for the teacher to wake him back up, him simply goofing around in P.E and not really taking anything seriously. The final bell that signaled the school day was finally over rang, Alex had made his way outside, adjusting his backpack as he walked.
"Hey, Alex.", the Omnitrix wielder perked up from hearing his name, he saw the same dark haired girl that he could now clearly see was leaning more into goth.
"Can I help you?"
"Yeah, actually.", she dug through her backpack. "My little sister got lost in New York once, however when we found her it felt more like she found us. She told us the scary but nice moth man came and helped her out, I thought it was bullshit but turns out it was you as that Uh... what was it?"
"Cold Soar."
"Yeah, him. She drew something for Cold Soar but didn't know how to give it to him, so when I heard about those aliens being you I brought it with me." she says as she handed him a folded up piece of paper, to which Alex unfolded and saw what you'd expect of a small child.
It had a poorly drawn version of Cold Soar with his wings unfolded, the little girl riding on his back and over the city. Two arrows identified them, if it wasn't obvious.
"And...", Alex was quickly met with a tight embrace from the gothic teen. "Thank you, thank you so much!", the way she said this made her gratitude clear and genuine. "I didn't know if she got kidnapped or something, but just... thank you."
She pulled away to show a soft smile on her face. "I don't care what anyone says, you're way better than that jackass Captain Nemesis.", she says as she walks away, entering a car that quickly drove off.
"Hmm...", Alex looked at the drawing, it was about as bad as it could get but... he felt happy. He wasn't used to getting any form of thanks due to the fact he fled the scene before any police could arrive.
"Harangue can go suck my nuts.", Alex says as he stuffed the drawing in his pocket, he looked over to see Hope waving at him with a smile. "This ain't so bad."
"FUCK!", the deranged doctor screeched with anger as he threw around equipments, banging his fist against the table. "FUCK FUCKING FUCK! FUCK THAT LITTLE PIECE OF SHIT RAT ASS BITCH ASS MOTHER-"
"Animo.", a familiar voice echoed as George walked into the room with a sharp black suit. "I'm aware you've put the time and effort into creating Roach King, and I apologize that it happened. But you could always remake it."
Animo finally took in the fact that unlike before, he wasn't in an abandoned buildings and dumpster diving for tech he could repurpose. "I see. Yes! You're right! We have more to look forward too!"
"I hate this guy.", said the other scientist that was next to him.
"Don't worry, we're all here for the same thing after all. It's just this and we'll go our separate ways.", George says with a polite smile.
"I'm getting paid right?"
"OF COURSE! I'm not unreasonable."
/End/